Hasta La Gadget!

Chatter of a 7-inch Xbox Surface tablet has reawakened, with sources claiming Microsoft is currently working in the initial hardware planning stages for a gaming-centric slate built on a custom Windows OS. The planned tablet is broadly in line with leaked specifications back in June, so insiders tell The Verge, though whether it runs a custom ARM processor or a new Intel SoC could depend on how well Intel can wow Microsoft. Unlike the first Surface tablet, which attempts a broad range of tasks, the Xbox Surface will be focused on gaming.

That focus will be expanded to accommodate messaging along with “other tablet functions” so it’s claimed, likely to include web browsing on IE10. However, the emphasis will be on gameplay, with the leaks earlier in the year indicating Microsoft would follow a path similar to that of the Wii U with a combined tablet and “base station” console that would work together.

Other specifications listed included a 7-inch 1280 x 720 multitouch display, Bluetooth, WiFi, and a 2.4GHz custom link between the tablet section and the twin-core main console unit. A healthy 5GB of speedy memory was also tipped, along with a custom 28nm AMD GPU paired with its own 1.2GB of GDDR5 RAM, and a 250GB 10,000 rpm HDD. A custom OS built on the Linux kernel – but not Windows 8 or Windows RT – would be running.

According to the leaks, the same hardware development studio responsible for quietly cooking up Surface as we know it today is also at least partially responsible for Xbox Surface. That facility – which Microsoft invited us to tour back in October, and which is shrouded in secrecy – was already tipped to be working on further Microsoft-branded hardware.

CEO Steve Ballmer, in fact, has said on several occasions that Microsoft will “obviously” do more hardware of its own, though declined to specify exactly what that might include. However, with Xbox SmartGlass for second-screen use of tablets (and Windows Phones) with an Xbox console, it comes as little surprise that more gaming-centric efforts are underway to help bolster the appeal of Microsoft’s ecosystem outside of enterprise users.

Xbox Surface will be produced in the same manner as the Surface tablet currently on the market, though the “Xbox 720” – as Microsoft’s next-gen console has been unofficially dubbed – would be outsourced in its production to one or more of the usual OEM partners. However, development on the games slate is also being undertaken at select Xbox facilities at Microsoft’s Silicon Valley campus, with word that the firm has apparently limited employee access to the Interactive Entertainment Business offices, something tipped to be so that internal testing and games programming can be undertaken.

Microsoft has declined to comment on the rumors.

Xbox Surface 7-inch tablet rumors reappear ahead of Xbox 720 is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

While many around the world get to enjoy the Xbox 360 console and the Xbox Live service that Microsoft offers, there are still some countries that have yet to experience that – in the official capacity at the very least and Israel is one of them. It seems that after seven years since the console was launched in the US, it will finally be making its way into Israel come 21^st of November. This was revealed by Steve Ballmer during his international promotional tour of Windows 8.

The console itself has been available in Israel albeit as a gray import, which means that there was no localized support and Xbox Live was pretty much a no-go, unless the owners registered their consoles with foreign accounts. The console itself will come with English manuals, although the good news is that for those who can’t read English, there will be phone support offered in Hebrew. Better late than never, right?

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Xbox 360 gets educational with financial news, Halo 4 will come with a two week Gold Xbox Live subscription,

For many, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion served as an introduction to DLC. Bethesda had its misses (horse armor anyone?) but it also some hits, one of which being the beyond excellent Shivering Isles expansion. Shivering Isles wowed Oblivion players when it released back in 2007, and ever since Skyrim was released, players have been asking for an expansion that’s on the same scale. So, is Skyrim‘s freshly-announced Dragonborn DLC the expansion everyone has been waiting for? There’s still a lot we don’t know, but what we do know suggests that it is.

Take, for instance, the fact that Dragonborn takes place on the island of Solstheim. The island, which lies off the northern coast of Tamriel, was already the setting of an Elder Scrolls expansion in the past: Morrowind‘s Bloodmoon. Right off the bat, we have our first evidence that Dragonborn will be a beefy expansion rather than a simple piece of new DLC – if Solstheim was big enough to take center stage is a previous expansion, it’s more than big enough to be the setting of a true-to-form Skyrim expansion.

Next we come to dragon mounts. It’s important to keep in mind that Bethesda hasn’t confirmed dragon mounts for Dragonborn, but the trailer for the DLC sure seems to suggest that players will get the chance to ride and control a dragon. If players can do so, that’s a huge feature – one that seems well-suited for an expansion but not a one-off piece of DLC like Hearthfire. That players can do something so epic is another thing that leads us to believe Dragonborn is the expansion we’ve all been waiting for.

In the trailer, we also get to see new enemy types, new weapons, and new armor. Naturally, that’s a no-brainer given the fact that Dragonborn takes place in an all-new setting, but the fact that we’re getting new enemies, weapons, and armor suggests that there’s plenty of content for players to devour. We also have the price to consider – 1600 MSP or $20. That certainly isn’t chump change, and even though Bethesda charged the same amount for Dawnguard, we’re thinking that the studio wouldn’t have an easy time getting away with charging much more. Therefore, $20 is about as much as Bethesda can charge for DLC, and it’s given Dragonborn such a price tag.

Finally, we’ve got the introduction of a new villain. If this were some paltry DLC offering, we wouldn’t be going toe-to-toe with the very first Dragonborn. We’ll have to wait until more details are released before making the final call, of course, but at the moment, Dragonborn is looking like the big Skyrim expansion we’ve all been hoping for.

Is Dragonborn the Shivering Isles DLC Skyrim fans crave? is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Call of Duty: Black Ops II – which is scheduled to launch next week and will undoubtedly be one of the biggest games of the year – has leaked. The Xbox 360 version made it onto the Internet over the weekend, and as a result, gameplay videos have been popping up all over the place. The game is due out on November 13, which means that Activision nearly made it to release without the game leaking.

An impressive feat to be sure, especially when you consider that Halo 4 releases tomorrow and was leaked a month ago. Treyarch game design director David Vonderhaar mentioned the leak on Twitter, and didn’t seem too upset over the idea that the game had leaked, instead taking a shot at the people streaming gameplay videos. “If you are going to live-stream the game early, which I don’t remotely recommend, you could at least be good at it. :P,” he said, followed by, “I’m really glad people are excited for the game. Legit streams coming up later this week and early next. Watch this space.”

Eurogamer tracked down one of these videos, which shows off the game’s new zombie mode. We’ve posted it below as well, but be warned: you probably shouldn’t click the play button on that video if you don’t want things spoiled ahead of release. If you’re finding it hard to resist the temptation, just remember that there’s only a week left to go before legitimate copies of Black Ops II are available for everyone to play.

Truth be told, we’re not surprised that Black Ops II became the victim of a leak before its release, but we are surprised that Activision managed to keep it from leaking for this long. Then again, it could be that Activision was the one that leaked it in the first place, attempting to hype the game even more before it launches on November 13. Since Activision apparently doesn’t want to talk about the leak, it looks like we’ll just have to settle for conspiracy theories instead. Who’s picking up Black Ops II on launch day?

Black Ops II suffers a leak ahead of release is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

We wish we could say otherwise, but unfortunately, sexism is something that runs rampant in our online gaming communities like Xbox Live and PSN. It seems that women who take their game online risk becoming the target of some kind of sexist comment every time they do, but fortunately, 343 Industries and Microsoft are going to do something about it. Trolls be warned, because if you begin flinging sexist remarks around in lobbies or in private messages while playing Halo 4, you might just earn yourself a lifetime ban from Xbox Live.

This crack down on sexism was revealed by 343 Industries lead Bonnie Ross and Halo 4 executive producer Kiki Wolfkill in an new interview with GameSpot. It sounds like these new rules against sexist remarks don’t just apply to Halo 4 either, but rather Xbox Live as a whole. “It can be dangerous to give adolescents a broadcast mechanism,” Wolfkill said. “There are always going to be jerks out there, and if you give them a way to express that side of their personality without being seen, you’re going to see this type of behavior manifest itself.”

Apparently this is a zero tolerance policy too, so if you’re found to be making sexist comments, don’t expect to get away with just a slap on the wrist. Wolfkill and Ross say that developers have a responsibility to break through gender stereotypes and stamp out sexism in the games industry too. It’s sad that it has to come to Xbox Live bans just to get people to act civil toward one another, but that’s unfortunately what you get when everyone is hidden behind a veil of anonymity.

Of course, there’s one easy way to avoid the banhammer altogether: just don’t be a jerk. It’s fine to get angry when you’re losing a match or can’t seem to get a decent shot in, but there are plenty of other ways to express that anger without resorting to bigoted or sexist remarks. What do you think of this new Xbox Live rule? Is the harsh punishment for the best?

343 Industries cracks down on Halo 4 sexism is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.